Chapter 12

Former FBI agents Thomas Seldon and Charles Richards checked into the investigation of the crash of the Southwest Pacific Airlines flight that Tom and Lynda were supposed to have been on the week before. Special Agent Jonnie North had gone to the crash site to aid in the search for clues. It was soon learned that the man who'd caused the crash was a former employee of the airline who'd been fired for petty theft of in-flight beverage sales.

The man had gone to his former supervisor to ask for his job back and his supervisor had refused to reinstate him. He'd taken that flight because his former supervisor at LAX lived in San Francisco and was also taking the flight home. The man had managed to sneak a .44 Magnum revolver that he'd borrowed from a co-worker past security using his USAir credentials.

Investigators found a note among the rubble at the crash site that the man had written on an airsickness bag; it was absolutely chilling. Hi Ray. I think it's sort of ironical that we ended up like this. I asked for some leniency for my family. Remember? Well, I got none and you'll get none.

What had seemed even more ironic to the investigators was that 43 people died because a man had been fired for stealing $69...

The dark forces had descended upon that despondent man as soon as they'd learned that two of the "chosen ones" had reserved tickets on that flight. And, yet again, their lives had been spared, but this time because other "chosen ones" had intervened ... without any help from The Guardians...

While interviewing the ticket agent that Tom had tried to convince to let him speak to someone in charge and tell them of the possible danger, Jonnie had noticed that he seemed very nervous. During further questioning, the man confessed to having been the one who'd loaned the perpetrator the gun! That was why he hadn't wanted to let Tom talk to anyone else, because he knew it was true...

The year 1987 ended with yet another airline disaster in Peru the day after the Southwest Pacific crash that killed the same number of people, some new advances in technology and the introduction of a drug that would lead to a big break for the dark forces of the universe ... Prozac. All of a sudden, along came this "happy pill" that took all worries away and left even more humans extremely vulnerable to having their "free will" manipulated...

Millions of Americans who struggled every day to follow paths of light were being bombarded by the facts that government corruption, crimes of hate, worldwide violence and natural disasters seemed to be increasing. Prozac was supposed to help them "not worry" about those troubling facts ... what it actually did was make them "not care." And it didn't take long for the dark forces to figure that out...

In early 1988, Jada Seldon was growing worried that she had, as yet, been unable to conceive. Wayne kept telling his wife that he was in no hurry for them to have children. He loved her and his love was not conditional on her ability to produce sons for him ... as most Saudi men prized in a wife! But Jada couldn't let it go ... she wanted to share children with her husband ... she wanted to be a mother!

Wayne had told Jada about all of his family and friends' special abilities and she'd told him that her brother Yosef had said Nuri also had an ability akin to Lily Richards' "gift" ... he could see into a person's heart. She was worried that something was wrong with her, so she asked Dr. Charlie Richards when they were gathered at Megan and Jonnie's house one night to see if he could sense anything.

Lily urged her husband to go ahead, so Charlie placed his left hand on Jada's lower abdomen and closed his eyes. He frowned and then looked worriedly at Jada as he said softly, "Something is definitely not right ... I don't sense anything specifically wrong ... but something is just not right. I'm sorry ... I know this doesn't sound like it makes any sense! There is nothing seriously wrong physically ... your overall health is good ... there doesn't seem to be any medical reason why you can't conceive. But there is something wrong ... I just can't tell what it is. Go to a gynecologist and have it checked out ... OK?" he advised her gravely.

She asked Megan to help her get an appointment with her gynecologist and then asked Megan to come with her, as she did not want to be alone with the doctor. She still had a faint fear of doctors due to an experience she had just before she'd left Saudi Arabia and come to the U.S. to attend M.I.T.

Megan's doctor could find nothing wrong during a physical examination and was intrigued by some small scars on her abdomen. When he asked her about them, she told him that a Saudi doctor had discovered what he'd called some benign cysts on her ovaries when they'd forced her to submit to a complete physical before allowing her to leave the country. The doctor had insisted that the cysts be removed before she was allowed to travel, so she'd been required to have the surgery before they let her leave.

The doctor frowned, as something didn't sound right to him. He asked Jada if she'd allow him to have some X-rays done on her abdomen so he could verify what she'd been told. A few days later, Jada and Megan were back in the doctor's office after he'd had a chance to review her X-rays with a technician. Jada was stunned by what they'd found...

"Mrs. Seldon ... I don't know how to tell you this ... but, when that surgery was performed, your fallopian tubes were tied. And, I hate to add that, your ovaries do not show any evidence of scarring to indicate the removal of any cysts ... I daresay that whole story was a ruse just to get you to submit to surgery so they could render you unable to conceive."

"Oh, my God," Megan whispered as her hand covered her mouth. She turned to look at her friend, who was just staring blindly into space. "Jada, honey ... are you all right?" she asked gently as she reached over to take the younger woman's hand.

Jada sprang out her chair, spouting a litany of Arabic curses that made both Megan and the doctor flinch and then stare at her wide-eyed as she continued shouting in Arabic, pacing back and forth in front of the windows. Then she finally broke down sobbing, bending over as if in pain. Megan jumped up and rushed over to her. She held Jada until she could stop crying, rocking her gently as she soothed her calmly.

That night, Wayne held his sobbing wife and cried with her as she told him what had been done to her. The only thing that had kept Jada from losing all hope was the doctor telling her after she'd calmed down that they'd likely be able to reverse the surgery, giving her a 50/50 chance at being able to conceive. However ... it would be considered an elective procedure and, therefore, not covered by insurance ... it would be costly ... and it wouldn't guarantee that she'd actually conceive.

Wayne assured her if she wanted to go through with it, he didn't care what it would cost. But he made her promise that whatever she decided, whether she was able to get pregnant or not, she was not to blame herself for his sake! "I mean it, Jada ... YOU are the most important person in the world to me! If we were meant to have children, then it will happen ... and if not ... then it was not your fault! It was your damn government's fault ... just remember that!" he growled and watched as an angry fire built in her eyes as her sobs faded...

Jada stared at her husband and stated a decision from her anger over the betrayal ... she'd been toying with the idea ever since they'd married but had hesitated because of an obviously misguided sense of loyalty to her homeland. "As soon as I'm eligible, I'm going to apply for U.S. citizenship ... I owe no loyalty to a country that would deliberately deceive me in such a personal matter! How dare they?!! In fact ... I would like to offer my services to the U.S. in any manner that I can to help bring to light whatever the Saudi government and OPEC are up to!!!"

Wayne went to his wife and tried to calm her. "Now Jada ... as much as I understand your anger and your desire to get back at them, you have to remember that your family is still in that country and your brother is already doing everything he can toward that end! If you get involved, too, and the Saudi government discovers that, it could put your brother and your whole family in danger. I'm sure that if Yosef needs our help with something, he will let us know. All right?!!"

She glared at him for a moment and then closed her eyes, nodding that he was right, so he continued, "Now ... just take some time and think about what you want to do ... about what was done to you. We'll have to do a lot of checking and find out about risks, costs, etcetera ... and I want to be involved in the process ... to tell you what I think and how I feel about it ... hoping that you'll take those into consideration. But the ultimate decision will be yours and I'll support whatever you decide. Do you understand?"

Jada's eyes filled with tears as she moved to her husband and clung to him as he embraced her. She realized how lucky she was to have such an understanding man ... And she realized that she'd never have been given the right or the freedom to make a decision regarding her own life ... her own body ... in the country of her birth! But her loving husband was leaving the decision of how to right the wrong that had been done to her completely in her hands...

Why was she suddenly frightened that she might make the wrong decision?!!

Megan North's producer wasn't allowing her as much leeway in her coverage of all the violence in the Middle East. She was relegated to following only those stories that also happened to make it on the major network news coverages in 1988.

Violence that broke out in Jerusalem between Israelis and Palestinians in January; a bomb that exploded outside of a major South African bank branch in the town of Oshakati in the northern region known as Namibia in February that no one claimed responsibility for. Megan suspected it had something to do with apartheid, but she was not allowed to pursue it ... even though soon afterward, hostilites continued to increase in South Africa and elsewhere in the world because of apartheid!

In March, a chemical weapons attack was launched on a northern Iraqi Kurdish town that Iraq immediately blamed on Iran, which was backed up by information from U.S. intelligence sources. Megan didn't buy it. Back in 1984, Iran had claimed that Iraq had been using chemical weapons all along, supported by photos of casualties obtained after Iraqi attacks on Iranian border towns.

There had been no previous evidence of chemical attacks in Iraq, and it was widely known that the Kurds had been trying to overthrow the Iraqi government under President Saddam Hussein, a member of the revolutionary Ba'ath Party. Megan's research had revealed that organization was seeking to unite the people and nations of the Arab world and that it strongly opposed any Western political involvement ... exactly what she was hoping no one in that region would be able to accomplish!!! Megan had felt chills roll down her spine...

She'd realized that Saddam Hussein likely posed more of a threat than the Ayatollah ... and the U.S. had been aiding that man's country in their invasion of Iran! She fully believed he would launch a chemical weapons attack in his own country if it was against any group who'd opposed him! Megan was almost afraid to keep digging into why the U.S. government was aiding Iraq...

She fervently hoped it was for the only reason that would make any sense ... in order to keep the nations of Islam in constant conflict so they wouldn't band together! But then ... how long would it take the Arab world to wake up and realize that "Western political involvement" was keeping them from achieving something they'd all love to do! U.S. involvement could be making matters worse! Megan could only hope the stupid Iran-Iraq war would end soon, and it appeared to be losing steam...

But the U.S. had also been aiding Afghanistan in their fight against the Soviet invasion since 1979. They'd been supplying munitions to the Islamist Mujahideen Resistance in their fight against the Soviet Red Army that had moved in at the request of the Marxist government of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. Tragically, in April, a large stockpile of munitions stored at a camp near Islamabad and Rawalpindi in Pakistan was sabotaged and the explosion killed more than a thousand people...

A month later, the Soviet Union started pulling their troops out of Afghanistan. They were more than likely giving up because the economy of the USSR was in a steady decline and they could no longer afford to fund a war they'd been fighting for over eight years with no progress having been made!

Just when it started to look like things might settle down in that region for a bit, the U.S. Navy made a mistake that further damaged the country's already bad reputation in the Middle East...

On July 3rd, a civilian Iranian Air flight was shot down over the Straits of Hormuz by the USS Vincennes, killing all 299 passengers and crew aboard. There was no excuse ... the Navy should've been able to identify that it was a civilian aircraft, but it had been mistakenly labeled as an attacking F-14 Tomcat. Iran and all the rest of the Islamic world had yet another reason to proclaim the U.S. as a nation of "infidels!"

In June 1988, Captain Brad Seldon was promoted to Major, called back to Houston and informed that he'd been selected as the pilot for an STS mission toward the end of the year. The first mission since the Challenger disaster was scheduled to launch in September, and if everything went as smoothly as they hoped, another mission was planned during the last quarter of the year.

At the end of September, the whole country breathed a sigh of relief when the Space Shuttle Discovery launched successfully. Major Thomas Bradley Seldon smiled widely as he picked up his eight-year-old son Tommy as they cheered while watching the launch on television at Johnson Space Center. Then Brad pulled his wife to him, hugging both of them as he declared excitedly, "Well ... I'm next, you guys! The next time, my family and friends will be watching me get launched into orbit! I can hardly wait!"

Barbie closed her eyes and swallowed her fear for her husband's sake ... she did not want to dampen his excitement when he was about to realize his dream...

In November, the Seldons made a quick trip out to the L.A. area to visit with Didi and Jay, who'd also recently been promoted to the rank of Major. Jay had invited Brad to come see what he and Capt. Karen Moss-Estevez had been involved with at Plant 42 ... they were holding a ceremony to unveil the B-2 Spirit stealth bomber. Brad was impressed to learn that his good friend, Major Jay Alan Hanson, had been named as the lead trainer for the first group of pilots assigned when the planes rolled out of production the following year.

Two days later, all of the families gathered for Thanksgiving at Bob and Lisa Clark's Bel Air mansion again and they could hardly believe how large their group had grown! The Seldon family was, by far, the largest group with thirteen ... even though their daughters-in-law, Barbie and Crystal, and their grandchildren, Tommy and Lana, belonged to other family groups as well!

The Richards, the Norths and the Estevezes all totaled eight members, including the ones shared by the other family units. But all together, there were thirty adults and children crowded around two separate tables in the the Clark's huge dining room!

Jada Seldon was still wrestling with the decision on whether to have surgery to reverse her forced sterility, and the more she watched how happy her sisters-in-law and friends were with their children that day, the more she longed for her own child. She made up her mind and was going to tell Wayne that night that she wanted to go through with it ... but not until after the busy holidays were over.

Immediately after Thanksgiving, Brad had to report to Kennedy Space Center. He was not allowed to discuss the mission with anyone as it was a classified Department of Defense mission. Barbie accompanied her husband ... she wanted to spend as much time as she could with him until he and the crew were sequestered. Their families had agreed to keep Tommy and bring him with them when they arrived the day before the scheduled launch.

Brad and Barbie spent most of the night before the crew was sequestered making love. Brad ended up taking his wife forcefully several times until they both came loudly in order to stop the tears that kept creeping into her eyes.

He rose up and slammed into her hard and deep as he growled, "Stop it, Barbie!!! Nothing's going to happen to me! The only thing that's going to happen is that I'm finally going to fulfill the only dream that YOU couldn't fulfill for me! I want this ... I've wanted this my whole life ... you've always known that!!! I want it almost as much as I've wanted YOU! Please don't be afraid ... just be happy for me ... and know that I'll be wishing every second I'm up there that you were there to share it with me..." His voice softened as he stared into her eyes.

Barbie sniffled and wiped the last of her tears away. "Well ... maybe if you told me about the mission I'd feel better ... instead of wondering if what you're doing for the DoD is just as dangerous as getting launched into orbit by what is supposedly a 'controlled explosion!'" She barked a laugh as she tried to make a joke.

Brad grinned sexily as he started moving inside her again. "Well ... I could tell you," he replied huskily as he withdrew slowly. "But then I'd have to ... kill you!" he growled savagely as he slammed inside her, causing her to moan loudly. "And I'm sorry, my love ... but I'm nowhere near through with you yet..." he murmured as his strokes grew deeper and harder, as did her moans...

The next morning, after the crew members had kissed their wives goodbye and were being transported to their pre-launch quarters, the other men, who were all several years older, were smirking at Brad. He frowned in confusion, lifting his shoulders and holding his hands palms up as he asked exasperatedly, WHAT?!! Why are you all looking at me like that?"

They all chuckled as the commander spoke. "After catching a good look at your sexy little wife this morning, we uh ... know now why you were making so much noise last night!!! That was a hell of a performance, buddy! Didn't anybody tell you how thin the walls are in the crew quarters, Seldon?!!"